The Final Ballad of Lucas North
by EscapeSunrise
Summary: The last moments of Lucas North's life. Ideally to be read in conjunction with the song Pillars of Salt by Murder By Death, but not inherently necessary.


Slow footsteps trudge forward, robotic, programmed, each step a burden weighing heavy as concrete. Judas swaddled in the robes of the Savior, dragging his personal cross to his own crucifixion.

One foot, then the next, in front of the other.

Pain rips through a numb body, consciousness barely aware of the razor-sharp ache emanating through the remaining shards of a soul. Memories flash behind glazed-over eyes, as vivid and bright as a sunrise: all those loved, all those lost. A life retaken, a fresh chance, tabula rasa. All the pure, untainted good achieved throughout 18 long years, done through another's eyes, in another's name. A stolen moniker that had become a true identity, no longer a feigned past, nor lies hissed off a forked tongue. A name that had transformed the sinner to a saint; the liar, the cheat, the manipulator…the terrorist: gone. Burnt to ash and shoved frantically into a cramped, sweaty box; submerged deep beneath the vast ocean of consciousness. Friends made, bonds formed, trust won…all remembered in slow motion, a yellowed movie reel, clicking as its spool unraveled; remnants of a dream that perhaps he had overheard while pressed sardine-tight against strangers on the tube, never truly his to experience, his to feel, his to love. A cry vehemently strangled itself in a throat tattered raw and ragged from screaming.

One foot, then the next, in front of the other.

Pandora's box smashed, no hope captured, the killer released in all his glory: a scarlet phoenix reborn from the cinders of sin, stronger and more powerful than before. Eyelids shut vigorously tight, glued down by sheer, leaden force of will, trying desperately, so desperately, to block the unfiltered truth. Memories, vicious black-sheened blood-red, seeped through the barrier, regardless of his wishes; all possible control had been long surrendered. Desperation recalled, a love remembered, countless acts done that his former self would have viewed in aghast horror. Friends deceived far past forgiveness, his own being unabashedly betrayed as he bare-handedly ripped his soul to jagged shreds.

One foot, then the next, in front of the other.

Shoulders stooped low under the heaviness of his private hell-world, his own feet forsaking him in his last hour of need: he stumbled. Body weighed down by the utter volume of his misdeeds, he fell to his knees. He may have been bleeding, now or since birth, but his mind was long past any such acknowledgement. The shell of the once-man dug his nails into the concrete and began to drag his broken body forward. Screams of the past echoed through ears, the husk unable to tell if they were his own, or the crimson pain of those he had destroyed time and again.

One knee, then the next, in front of the other.

One man demolished, another destroyed thereafter; two identities, yet nothing left. Only a crawling corpse, fingers staining the rooftop red. Another sob reverberated deep through his being, a violent protest to the burning memories he was being forced to mentally watch through no will of his own. Maya's anguished wails mingled with Harry's howls of treason, til the thunderous volume drowned out all sounds of the tangible world.

One knee, then the next, in front of the other.

Fingertips scraped along, searching, then found air, and the corpse opened its dead eyes, peering blearily out at a world that he had broken…and that had broken him. There may have been someone behind him, but it had ceased to matter; his eyes could only see his final prize, ethereal blinders allowing only a single reality into his mental focus. Shakily, using the last shred of strength left within his wrecked limbs, he slowly, torturously, got to his feet. He looked out through bloodshot eyes: the sun was shining, the sky blue, a breeze gently tousled his hair, a cardinal trilled happily on the horizon; he was aware of precisely, heartbreakingly, none of it. Numb: numb to the world, numb to himself, numb because all that was left of his existence was unbearable pain. One last cry ripped from his core and his entire body trembled; shifting a heavily-lidded gaze downwards, he saw nothing but blessed, precious, perfect open air. A final tsunami of ink-black memory washed over him, excruciatingly brilliant, and he went under; a sea of guilt and pain, regret and depression surged around him: two bodies in one stuck in the maelstrom, both suffocating, no surface in sight. Neither survived that ocean, leaving lifeless, shattered corpses floating deep below its depths. The shell was left standing, breeze still licking hair, playful and enticing, but the corpse felt nothing but the drowning wave.

_I'm nothing._

One foot, then the next, in front of the other.

Release.


End file.
